African filmmaking : north and south of the Sahara /

Several recent books have dealt with African filmmaking, above and below the Sahara. These regions are usually considered separately, but Armes changes that pattern, announcing his intention in the book's subtitle. He groups the Maghreb (Tunisia, Morocco, and Algeria) with the 12 countries formed immediately south of the Sahara from French West Africa and French Equatorial Africa. These regions are similar in crucial respects: all the countries are postcolonial; all were colonized or heavily influenced by France; all are Islamic, or have a powerful Muslim minority; all juxtapose modernity and traditional lifestyles; nearly all have autocratic rulers. These factors account for the slow growth and minimal productivity of indigenous film industries in the region. In fact, African film emerges in an almost paralyzing "world of contradictions" from the 1890s to the present. In the last section, "The New Millennium," Armes (Middlesex Univ., UK) provides detailed career histories of individual directors working in Chad, Burkina Faso, Tunisia, Morocco, and Mauritania. This conscientious, scholarly work exists because attention must be paid, not because the world is about to experience a surge of films from Africa. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty. R. D. Sears Berea College